The present invention relates to a data management system suitable for creating and managing various databases.
Conventionally, a data dictionary/directory (DD/D) is adopted as a database management system. The DD/D manages a data item appearing on a database as a core of a data system and its attribute, accumulates "metadata", and generally performs system operations and maintenance support. However, since a complex "relation" between various data elements cannot be expressed by the DD/D, it is difficult to search data elements and items having a relation therebetween.
As a means for expressing the "relation" between data elements, a relational database (RDB) using a relation model has been proposed. However, in order to express the relation with the RDB, a "table" must be created, and matching processing during a search operation takes a great deal of time. In addition, in order to update one record, n records must be updated.
Alternatively, as a means for expressing the "relation" between data elements, a COOASYL (an acronym for Conference For Data Systems Languages) type database is known. However, in a database of this type, a registration order of the data elements is fixed, and arbitrary data elements cannot be registered as needed, or data elements cannot be related after they are registered.